This record was recorded at Futureappletree Studio Too in various locales … Rock Island, Illinois, The Pierce School Mall in Davenport, Iowa, and at home on 8 and 24 track analog tape, mixed to ¼" tape.

Produced, engineered, mixed by Patrick Stolley.

Mastered by Carl Saff, Chicago.

Sleeve design by Tod Foley.

This effort is dedicated to my parents, who died separately over the five years it took to see it through.

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I can’t understand a word you’re saying
Your buzzing mission is a game you’re playing in my mind
You know it happens all the time
Sometimes I listen and the world starts swaying
Your blessed kisses to my eyes I’m praying for a life
You know I’ve got to have a life
And every time the day turns into night you’ll be coming home
You’ll be right a home
Curses wishes calls and crimes you ask me
The kind of things you want are just so taxing I could cry
You know I really want to cry
All histories are mysteries you’re claiming
I know the stories and the truths are shaking like lies
You know I really got to fly
And in and out the corners of my mind
Trapped inside the prison of design
Deep inside the fortress of my hide
I can stay too long
I can’t stay too long

Track Name: The Hill Pt. 1

when you came down from the hill
some fire had passed between us
the light in your flickering eyes started to die
later on there were pills
there were nuggets of life in the séance
there were tiny mites brushing by with wisdom inside
and you were always oh so young
the secrets came slowly and one by one
bringing tastes wholly and gently formed to cry
you’re crying on
where the path led there were chills
there were dark spots on the ceiling
there were cries in the deep of the night, in the heart of the tide
so roll on, rollup girl
you got to pick a past to believe it
you got to nail down a time to hold it in mind
and you are still so very young
the secrets raise up and they fall apart
shoot straight out and are quickly gone, so blind
oh, I can’t believe it
oh, I can’t believe it’s real
oh, I can’t just reach into the emptiness
hold your hand and lead you back
wipe your tears and tell you it’s alright
you’re crying on

Track Name: The Other World

the priest pulled back my tiny hat and said
“I’ve seen ’em come like this one before”
“the worthless brat”
The water sat where it rolled off of my forehead to the floor
I said “oh it’s you … they know you aren’t true in the other world”
Uh huh
So I trod on down the shining path
Yes I could see light under every door
The leaves on trees and the lover’s laughs
Oh yes they soaked into my very pores
Oh it’s true you know it’s very true
It’s wonderful
Oh it’s loose…the spirits got to choose it’s own reward
It’s own reward
Then there was you
You came floating on down from above
Bringing your memory calling “come”
Over the city softly weaving a net for my love
Bringing me gentle into sleep
Into sleep

Track Name: Flood

I
When the ridiculous truth begins to suffer you to tell it
Your mind forms only lies and abstract thought
I’ll be waiting where you go to bubble down the cellar
And once we are inside we can talk
We can talk about beautiful dreams
Of summers running barefoot
We’ll laugh all the time, our bitters gone
You’ll see from above what was never true embellished
With movement in life no, you were wrong
And when you see that I…
That I had died, that I had cried,
Been brought to life
There was a blur of light
A greenish sky
A friendly smile
A heart behind
II
It was a beautiful day for going down down down
So down we went to the tune of the beating hearts of children
Our gods washed the sky
The streets, cold hard, kind
And the weight had blown out the mists of hot july
There were things to do that only we know how to do
I ran right home to show you, you didn’t seem to care
The flood it tried to take me from your caress
Out of your hair
Out of your care
III
I saw a fox jump in a yellow field orange blur bouncing
I saw three layers of mountain, green, blue, gray
Stars moving away in the summer sky stars in my mind, in my
body
Small sparrows wheeling trading with bats at tag in the dusk
Soft leaves in haze of august sun, the touch of my babies
Out among the statues, sparkling in the air
Everywhere the kingdom is you are there

Track Name: Disaster!

Delicate, your screams come down the hallway,
Slipping through your hands on and up away
Ghosts of eyes bony fingers barbs of wire and specters
Ringed and gray they burrow to this day
Limbs so high your toes just brush the branches
As your winglets flit and sway on and up away
Blink your eyes and roll into the doorway
The shadows disintegrate
They simply mist and fade
What you gonna do when you can’t survive?
You’re golden
What you gonna do when you recognize
The screen’s been pulled back, gentle veil’s been raised?
Dreams of disaster, the world flipping over
These things are gonna have to wait
Lords of disorder, demons of the night
Pardon me you’re getting in the way
Chinks in your armor
Holes in your plate
Glimpses of the spirit stripped away
Lights in the harbor, fog in the bay
Seas of fingers scratching at your fate
This pounding in your head’s got louder
This sleep you cannot shake
This beacon in the night so troubled
My love will keep you warm
A million light years on
My love will keep you warm until you’re home

Track Name: Know Past, Know Future

No past, no future
Just slipping sideways through your life all the time
No cast, no sutures
Your wounds they ripen in your mind, in your mind
No crash, no movement
No end to questions calls and cries all through time
And you don’t know what to do
Cuz you can’t change things
Know past, know future
Just slipping sideways through your life all the time
Slow fast, slow clueless
You reach for certainty and sigh, you just sigh
Blow blast, blow ruthless
Those candles flicker as they die, as they die
And you don’t know what to do
Cuz you can’t change things
And you don’t know what to do
Cuz you can’t change a thing
You used to think there was a future you would land in and be true again
You used to think there was a past that hadn’t happened and you’d disappear
Now it’s all an event, a solid ball of you that’s barely here
What kind of method can you use to open up and take a look around
And stop the static ALL

Track Name: Vampire Bats, Mall Rats

Vampire bats mall rats greasy stares and funny hats
Listen to their radios and make a path to where it’s at
And all along the boulevards they scrub the yellow grasses with their eyes
Welcome mats, kitty cats drinking milk and licking laps
Hiding slimy noses under rims of bowls they roll and bat
And wonder where their mommies are so late into the chilly autumn night
Driveway sets, immobile vets rollin’ dice and red corvettes
Bleary-eyed replacements for the promises and hopeful gets
The droplets in the river of a thousand vanished hopefuls trickled by
Look who’s coming through the kitchen door
He’s got some mud on his shoes…it isn’t reasonable
Every time that boy comes breezing through another chance is met
Another clouded, dimly lighted fuse
Take your choice of myths to vet: Jesus Christ or Boba Fett
They’ll lock you in the storage hold and freeze your ass and never let you
Kiss your rightful princess with the frozen lips you traded for a smile
Even so it’s pitter-pat listen low and breathing fast
Slipping past security and waiting for another chance to snatch a grain of freedom from
the beach of them they’re keeping from your sight
Look who’s coming through the kitchen door
He’s got some mud on his shoes despite the screaming and the last bruise
Every time we turn he’s playing fool
I will set things right it’s only reasonable to assume…
There’s so much one needs to learn about love
I will set him right
I will keep him straight and narrow

Track Name: The River

When you come to the river will you go or will you row?
Then you get to the water will you glide or ride?
There’s a soft song a-blowing from the flow to your soul
There’s a breath of a question you can’t hide
Are you true?